


Magnanimous

by charcoalwinter



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: !!!, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Feels, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Bucky Barnes Recovering, Bucky Barnes Remembers, Civil War Fix-It, Communication, Conflict Resolution, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Death, Nightmares, Not Beta Read, Not Captain America: Civil War (Movie) Compliant, One Shot, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Talking Like Adults, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, but I'm tagging it anyway, or at least... he's trying to remember, seriously it's barely a sentence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-20
Updated: 2019-09-20
Packaged: 2020-10-10 12:57:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,180
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20528411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/charcoalwinter/pseuds/charcoalwinter
Summary: WOTD 05-09-2019magnanimous [mag-nan-uh-muhs]adjective:generous in forgivingan insult or injury;free from petty resentfulnessor vindictiveness e.g.to be magnanimous toward one’s enemiesTo summarise this fic in a very brief manner:After unwillingly reliving the event, Bucky confronts Tony about the death of his parents.Otherwise known asCaptain America: Civil Resolution™.





	Magnanimous

**Author's Note:**

> Based on dictionary.com’s word of the day. The underlined section of the definition is the part that I shall be following.
> 
> Set during a period where Bucky is getting his memories back and working on recovery. You know how at the start of my fics that are set in the canon universe, I say this: _They're living in Av. Tower and CA: CW didn’t happen because everyone talked it out like adults. Ta-da._ Yep, I guess this is the fic that sorts that shit out. Very basic, multi-universe, multi-use prequel? Hell yeah!!!
> 
> I do not own Marvel or any of Marvel’s characters. The writing and the plot are my own work and all mistakes are solely mine. Please do not make any of the actors aware that this exists.

Screams, gunshots, coldness, rushing footsteps, bloodshed, explosions, screeching tyres, crying, pain, pain, pain.

Bucky jerks awake with a gasp, the unpolluted room-temperature air entering his lungs in a welcome breath of freshness. The soaked hair plastered to his face and neck feels suffocating and it makes him wonder, yet again, why he hasn’t just chopped it all off. His cheeks are damp too, though he can’t tell whether the cause is tears or sweat. Probably both.

He doesn’t bother sitting up or removing himself from the damp and rumpled sheets. The clock on his bedside table tells him that it’s 0240. If Bucky got up to shower now, Steve would undoubtedly be able to hear him moving around and leave his own room in order to check that everything’s alright. It isn’t. And Bucky can’t find the energy to even pretend that it is, so he stays put on his soggy patch of mattress, trying not to shout in frustration or sob in helplessness.

It’s not like Steve doesn’t know what he’s currently going through - he might not _understand _it, but he knows that since Bucky has somewhat settled into life and free will, his brain has considered him ready to start dealing with the trauma of his past.

Waking up from nightmares -_memories_\- is not an uncommon happening these days, much to Bucky’s distress. Sure, he gets flashes here and there throughout the day, but it’s during the night, when his mind has minimal fortifications erected to protect it, that the movie-length, high-definition quality reruns of his life start playing in the forefront of his mind at full volume.

Sometimes, they’re pleasant:  
He’s in the kitchen with his Ma in 1925, supposedly helping her bake a peach pie. In reality, his eight-year-old self only succeeds in leaving floury handprints around her workspace. He receives a light flick from her tea towel before they both collapse into laughter and proceed to dance around each other, patterns of flour painted on their skin.

Sometimes, they’re neutral, neither happy nor horrendous:  
He’s at the park with Steve in 1928, lightly rubbing the punk’s chest and coaching him through a breathing exercise because they were running too fast and _“you gotta learn to stop when your body tells you to stop, Stevie. C’mon, in and out, real slow.” _Poor, stubborn Stevie never did learn.

Sometimes, they’re dark, ghastly, terrifying, and leave him unable to sleep again for days:  
He’s lying on a table in Azzano in 1943, and the mad doctor is plunging burning liquid into his veins over and over.  
He’s falling through clouds in 1945, blinking his way through the sleet to catch one last glimpse of the train as he plummets to the ground waiting solidly below.  
He’s slinking through a family home in 1986, silent and blending into the shadows, his presence unknown to the politician, his wife, and his four-year-old daughter, all of whom will shortly be left repainting their flooring a delicate shade of red titled ‘Fresh Blood’.

At this point in time, he seems to be receiving an unfairly ratioed amount of negative to neutral or positive memories. Though maybe that’s what he should expect. After all, more of his life has been spent murdering, spying, and bringing down governments than it has been spent wandering through the streets of New York, whistling a joyous tune and tipping his hat at the lovely ladies who gave him a smile or a wink.

Perhaps, considering all of the lives that he’s taken and the even larger number that he’s ruined, Bucky should think himself lucky that he gets to relive any good times at all. If he were to spend the rest of his life being bombarded with all of the torturing, blackmailing, and other devious tasks that he carried out for Hydra over the years, he would deem himself deserving of that punishment and take it for as long as the world saw fit.

On days when Bucky finds the monumental effort that is required to push aside the whirlpool of horror inside his brain and leave the safety of his and Steve’s floor, the other residents of the Avenger’s Tower are wary of him. Bucky gets it; he supposes if a one-hundred-year-old scraggly joke of a human being burst into _his _life with a fizzled brain, a metal arm, and more than two-dozen known assassinations under his belt, he’d be wary too. Objectively, it’s certainly not an unwarranted reaction.

It seems that the only person willing to spend more than five minutes in his presence is Steve. Steve, who can be overbearing at the best of times, despite how well he means. Steve, who can be so downright suffocating in his attempts to jog Bucky’s memories of the ‘good old days’, that he doesn’t notice Bucky checking out in an unconscious effort to protect himself.

Oh, aside from Steve, there is one other person who doesn’t completely tense up when Bucky walks into a room. Granted, it seems like Tony would rather be with his arm than his person, but company is company and Bucky has been severely lacking quality in that department for the better part of a century.

As an added bonus of this tentative acquaintance, his under-socialised self doesn’t even have to work very hard when it comes to being around Tony. The man is more than content to babble to nobody in particular as he goes about his tasks, not minding the assassin that lurks nearby nor holding the expectation of verbal input over Bucky’s head when the latter would much rather sit quietly and observe.

The two don’t spend a lot of time together, but Bucky has certainly witnessed an adequate amount of the man’s behaviours to get a detailed gauge of his personality. More so than the rest of the Avengers, who he stays away from whenever possible because, while he does understand their hesitance, it still hurts to read the caution that lingers in their eyes and the lines of their bodies.

Tony is caring and generous and smart. Solely from what Bucky has experienced himself, he knows that Tony is a good person. Tony, even having the knowledge that Bucky had worked for Hydra (circumstances notwithstanding) and had killed and committed countless atrocities in their name, had still provided Bucky with somewhere to go when Steve eventually managed to drag him in from the cold.

Not only that, but to this day he continues to fund Bucky’s life at the Tower -food, clothes, toiletries- without having been asked in the first place, and he takes the time to check up on Bucky’s mental and physical health, as well as constantly upgrading his arm - initially so that it no longer caused pain to stand upright, but more recently in the name of fun. The arm part is definitely for mutual benefit, but it’s still a kindness that Bucky can’t find from the other members of the team.

This kindness often makes Bucky wonder what he did to deserve it. It makes him wonder if it’s a trick, a scam, another form of torture rather than a show of support. Is it too good to be true, or can he finally rest in contentment?

˚*•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙*˚*•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙*˚ 

He’s not at all surprised when the memory brings itself forward, reminding him of another mission where death and destruction had occurred at his hand. He’s angry and scared and shocked, but not surprised. Because of course he unknowingly managed to ruin the one good relationship (outside of Steve) that he has in this century. And he did it in 1991, before he even _knew_ Tony.

The night of his damning awakening is warm, as nights often are in the middle of summer. Despite the humid atmosphere, Bucky jolts from the depths of slumber with a scream in his throat, cold as ice and shivering so hard that his jaw is starting to ache. The bedding he lies in is once again damp with sweat that does nothing to raise his temperature or comfort his fragile state.

With tears trickling down his cheeks and snot clogging up his nose, he barely manages to hold back another wail of terror and regret. It comes out a choked cry, which leads into another and another, and soon he has curled his body into a tight ball, shaking and shuddering through the flashes that continue to replay behind his eyelids.

The hoarse whisper of his name echoing from the lips of a long-dead man haunts his ears as do the pained groans of a long-dead woman. The crunching of bone beneath his fist causes tingles to shoot from his knuckles all of the way up his bionic arm, while his biological hand aches with the memory of squeezing the life out of an innocent. The smell of blood and the burning rubber from the tyres lingers in his nose, stuck there with two decades of rot.

He deserves this.

And he knows with all of his heart and without a doubt, that this is not something he can keep from Tony. Bucky has spent most of his life being manipulated and used, and he will not do the same thing to anybody else, especially not to someone who has shown him such compassion that Bucky truly doesn’t believe he is worthy of. It will surely hurt Tony, himself, and perhaps even the rest of the Avengers, but the truth needs to be told.

When he finds the strength to rise from his crying and unstable condition, he’ll make sure his go-bag is ready and he’ll confront the consequences of his actions long ago carried out.

˚*•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙*˚*•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙*˚

Bucky finds Tony in his lab a day later. It looks like he’s working on some Widow Bite upgrades as he hums along to what Bucky recognises as Led Zeppelin’s _Ramble On_. The familiar scene is one that Bucky has witnessed many a time before, and one that he doesn’t want to destroy. But he has to, before this revelation inside of him burns up and tears him down piece by piece until there’s nothing left.

He clears his throat to signal his presence, not unlike his usual arrival announcement, and when Tony spins around and smiles at the sight of him, the delight and hopefulness in his expression sends a flood of stinging guilt through Bucky’s entire being.

“Hey,” Bucky mutters, more to his feet than to Tony. The nerves fluttering in his stomach won’t settle, so he decides to bypass any pleasantries and jump straight in. “I have something that I need to tell you.”

That erases the happiness from Tony’s face. “Are you okay, bud? What is it?”

“Not, uh, not really.” Bucky aches to pull out a stool and collapse onto it to hide the trembling of his knees, but holds back, knowing that there is no point seeing as his company won’t be wanted for much longer. Stupidly, he didn’t think to plan his confession ahead of time and now that he’s here, trying to tell Tony that he’s the reason the man is an orphan, suddenly his mouth feels dry and the right words are dodging out of his grasp.

Bucky takes a deep breath, wanting to look an anxious Tony in the eyes but not finding the courage. “Your parents,” he starts, and notices the muscles in Tony’s shoulders immediately tense up.

“Yeah?” Tony questions, not harshly, but certainly not the kind tone that Bucky has come to expect from him.

One more deep breath. “They died on December 16th 1991\. I think… I _know_… I did it, I… I killed them.” Tony’s breath hitches but he doesn’t say anything, and so Bucky forces himself to carry on, needing to get out everything he can before he breaks down or Tony exiles him, whichever may come first. “I was friends with Howard, back in the war, and he recognised… he said my name right before I did it. I thought… I thought…” Bucky stops and tries to collect himself, ignoring the sharp tears welling in his eyes as he stares at Tony’s jeaned knees. “Your mother was there and she called for Howard, and then I just… I couldn’t stop myself…”

“Enough.” Tony’s rough voice cuts through his own sputtering attempts at verbal communication.

Bucky finally meets his gaze and sees that his russet eyes are red and irritated, a multitude of emotions swimming within them, but no tears. Not like Bucky, who can feel the salty drops falling down his face and catching in his two-day-old stubble.

“I didn’t know until yesterday,” Bucky admits, speaking only when he’s sure that Tony isn’t going to. “I wanted -_needed_\- to tell you so that you knew the truth.” His breath catches in his throat, but he pushes past the lump, somehow sounding more put together than he genuinely feels even as he stumbles over every other word. “I’m sorry I took them away from you. It’s not fair that you’ve had to live without them for so long, and I just… I just want to thank you for your hospitality, for offering me kindness when nobody else would.”

Bravery escapes him once more and Bucky turns to staring at his hands. “I’m going to leave. You won’t have to be around me anymore be reminded of all of this.” He takes a step towards the door and then stops, fingers tangling together in misery and unease for his unclear future. “I’m sorry,” he whispers, a final apology and goodbye before he continues his walk to the exit with determination.

There’s so much stress and regret and worry running through his head that he almost misses Tony calling him to “wait!” Bucky has one foot out the door by the time it registers, and he whirls around to see Tony standing before him, eyes now damp, body language unsure.

After a minute of staring sadly at each other, Tony clears his throat like he means to speak, but then he falls silent for another minute, seemingly combing extra carefully through his thoughts and his words.

The suspense has Bucky’s stomach rolling in upset, and he very nearly walks away to save himself. But, at the very least, he owes the man to listen to what he has to say. If Tony can stand before him and look him in the eyes after what Bucky has confessed, then Bucky can return the favour, no matter how much discomfort it causes him.

At last, Tony finds his voice. “I’m not going to kick you out, Bucky,” he begins. Bucky’s eyes widen in disbelief, but Tony keeps talking. “I need some time, though. I need you to stay away from me until I’m ready, okay?”

Bucky nods in response, his throat tight and refusing to produce noise. When his stupefied self makes no move to retreat from the lab, Tony prompts him with a murmured, “I think you should go now.”

And so, Bucky does.

˚*•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙*˚*•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙*˚

He doesn’t leave his and Steve’s floor for four days. The only time he exists his room is to use the bathroom or grab another bottle of water. He doesn’t eat. He doesn’t talk to Steve when his friend comes knocking. He doesn’t sleep.

More nightmares than ever are plaguing his attempts, each recovered memory filled with horror and deceit. He feels like he loses one small part of himself for every flash of the Winter Soldier that he gains. It’s depressing and draining and downright terrifying. All of the work that Bucky has put towards becoming a semi-stable man again over the past few months, and now the results are dwindling away before his tired eyes.

Currently, at 1607 on day five of his despondent, hermit vacation, Bucky is lying on his bed, curled up on his side and staring at his alarm clock as it counts the minutes by. The blankets surrounding him are starting to smell from the constant overuse, so badly that even he notices. But he can’t bring himself to get up for longer than it takes to get to the bathroom, do his business, and return to his hollowed-out spot.

His hair is greasy with sweat from his panics and his skin is just as oily. The baggy clothes that he’s bundled up in also have a strong odour wafting from them, but getting changed would mean being naked for at least a few seconds, and Bucky shivers rapidly whenever he isn’t tightly folded into his nest. If he gets any colder, he fears he’ll start to freeze, his lungs the first part of him to constrict and lock up, as they always were when he was forced into cryo.

There’s a knock at his door at 1610 which interrupts him from his bodily assessment. Bucky assumes it’s just Steve, here to beg him to leave his room or eat something or “_talk about it_”. He ignores the sound, knowing that Steve will eventually realise that his efforts are for naught.

“Bucky?” A tentative voice comes from the other side of the door. It’s not Steve voice; it’s Tony’s.

Bucky’s heart clenches with the realisation that he’s about to get booted out of the Tower. He had been expecting that conclusion, but to know he’s soon to hear the words being spoken out loud and the deed to become official… well, it’s distressing and nerve-wracking anyway.

And Tony, knowing and understanding what Bucky had done, is here to deliver the news himself. The strength and bravery that he possesses is beyond those qualities of Bucky; he is weak and shrouded in negativity where Tony stands tall and spreads the goodness of his heart. But his integrity apparently does have a limit, and that limit lies in opening his home to his parents’ killer.

It’s a clear and logical place for a limit to be and Bucky won’t fight the man’s decision. He just needs a few more hours before he faces the music, that’s all - one to bury deeper into his bed and escape from the world for a little bit longer, one to wash himself and tidy his room so that nobody else has to deal with any more of his messes, and one spare to argue with Steve and convince him to let him go.

“It’s Tony,” the voice says, like Bucky doesn’t know. “Can we please talk, buddy?”

_Buddy?_ But Tony continues before Bucky can figure out what that means, as is common when in conversation with a genius whose mind runs far too quickly for most to follow.

“Steve said you haven’t been eating. I brought burgers from that diner you like.”

Okay, what? Bucky sits up, wiping the teary residue from his face and pushing his hair out of his eyes. This seems cruel. Tony playing nice, calling him ‘buddy’, and bringing his five-day empty stomach some sustenance, all so that the two can talk and Tony can kick him onto the streets? That doesn’t sound like a trick Tony would pull.

But then again, Bucky offed his parents and then became almost-friends with him, right before the ground split beneath his very feet and swallowed him into his own personal Hell. Perhaps Tony has a special place in that glowing heart of his for murderers and liars like Bucky.

“Come on, Bucky,” Tony whines, the way he does when he’s overly tired and trying desperately to get something he wants.

Bucky sighs and croaks out an “okay”, hoping it’s loud enough to reach Tony’s ears. His throat is dry and sore from crying, exhausted like the rest of him, and he doesn’t want to speak more than he needs to.

Thankfully the door opens without further hesitance and Tony’s rumpled head peeks into the room. Immediately, his nose scrunches and his eyes squint, the chaotic wreck of the space hitting him all at once.

Bucky almost feels bad for the stench and the state of himself, but he can’t quite bring himself up to that point of caring. Not having any idea where to start or what to say, he sits quietly and waits for Tony to make the next move.

Tony, when he apparently realises that Bucky isn’t going to open the conversation, steps closer and holds up the paper bag in his hand. “Would you, uh, would you eat with me?”

A loud rumble echoes from Bucky’s stomach at the same time that he nods his confirmation.

Tony smirks at that, further confusing Bucky with his amiability. While the man comes across as uncomfortable due to the looming conversation and it’s also clear that, like Bucky, he hasn’t had a lot of sleep the past few days, he isn’t giving off any angry, hurt, or resentful vibes. He doesn’t look like the kind of person who is about to throw someone out into the cold.

This is all too much thinking for Bucky’s starved and restless brain. He decides to, for once in his long and incessant life, cast aside his assumptions and his doubts, and let the scenario play out with a blank and open mind. The apprehension that bubbles throughout his entire being can’t be quieted though. It froths and gurgles as Bucky remains patient in awaiting Tony’s guidance.

“Okay, how about we step out to the living room because, no offence, it reeks in here,” Tony offers with his nose still crinkled in distaste.

Again, Bucky nods his assent. He scrubs his flesh-and-bone hand over his face one last time and pushes the heavy covers aside to rise and follow Tony from his decently-marked territory. As he reaches the doorway, a breeze from the air conditioning system catches him and he stops, a shudder rocking his shoulders down to his knees. Briefly, his mind flicks back the first, agonising gust of manufactured cold that would soon stop the blood in his veins, turn his muscles to stone and his heart to ice.

“Bucky?”

Bucky looks up to see Tony watching him cautiously with concern written across his visage.

“Y-yeah,” he stutters. “I just… just need to-” Bucky jerks a shaky thumb over his shoulder, gesturing back to his room. “Give me a second,” he murmurs, already turning around and retreating.

The second he’s properly inside, Bucky closes the door, shutting off Tony and the weight of his gaze. He takes a deep breath, clenching his fists open and shut, and concentrates on the feel of blood pumping through his body, steady and warm.

When he gets his breathing and his mind under as much control as he has these days, he quickly strips out of his musky, sweaty hoodie and sweatpants and grabs the cleanest, snuggest replacements that he can find in his wardrobe. He pulls them on with as much efficiency as he removed them, and even though his skin remains unwashed and uncared for, the feel of fresh clothes upon his person make a huge difference in his comfort, and the icy trembling of his limbs begins to decrease.

Feeling a little more ready to face Tony and the world outside of his sanctuary, Bucky makes another attempt at it.

He finds Tony in the living room, as was planned to be their discussion location, sitting straight-backed on the largest sofa. The grease-spotted paper bag rests on the oakwood coffee table, unopened. Bucky clears his throat and puts on a brave face as he shuffles around to plop heavily into his favourite armchair, the position putting him perpendicular to Tony on the man’s left.

The atmosphere is tense again, neither one having a clue where to begin. Tony is apparently just as nervous as Bucky, who is doing his best not to skitter back to his room while waiting for his fate to be announced.

Eventually, it seems that Tony can’t handle the uncomfortable silence anymore, and he reaches forward to pull two burgers out of the bag and tosses one wrapped-up bundle to Bucky. “I’d like to thank you.”

Bucky, busy nervously fiddling with the paper-covered package in his hands, snaps his head up at the words, his eyes large and shocked. “W-what?”

“For telling me,” Tony clarifies as he tears the wrapping off his greasy snack. “I’m sure it took a lot to come out and lay something like that on the table, so to speak.”

Still startled, Bucky stutters through some kind of response, not sure how to react to being applauded and shown appreciation for doing -what he thought to be- a right and just thing. “I, uhm, o-okay.”

His pathetic attempt at recognition doesn’t faze Tony though, who continues as though he never stopped speaking, as per Tony Stark Protocol. “Usually I suck at sorting these things out but I’m going to do my best for you, Bucky-Bear.” Bucky blinks. Tony ploughs on. “When you first told me, I was angry, confused, hit in the face by twenty-year-old grief, and feeling really fucking betrayed. I couldn’t deal with it all.”

Listening intently, Bucky nods in understanding where necessary, trying to encourage Tony and show him as much support as he needs to get his two cents out. He desperately wants to believe that this conversation isn’t going to go the way he’s expecting, but every time he gets close, the image of that road on that cold, dark night flickers behind his eyes and drags him unwillingly back to reality.

“But I’ve seen your files before,” Tony continues, after taking a sizeable bite out of his burger and gulping it down. “I looked at them again over these past few days. A lot. I know that can probably be considered a massive breach of privacy, but…” he trails off and shrugs before taking another bite, this time chewing slowly, carefully, and pondering with just as much intensity.

Bucky remains quiet throughout Tony’s speech and considerations, not wanting to disrupt the man’s thought processes or wreck the now calm atmosphere that is somehow surrounding such a strained conversation topic.

His rumbling stomach reminds him of how long it has been since he’s eaten properly, but with the anxiety symptoms that are concentrated around his gut, Bucky himself suddenly isn’t hungry. The burger in his mismatched hands cools with every passing second, but he can’t bring himself to devour it. He holds his stiff and upright position instead, waiting patiently for Tony to finish his mouthful and get to his point.

“What you went through, what they _did to you_, that wasn’t your fault.” Tony catches his eye and holds his gaze, his dark chocolate orbs sharply piercing Bucky’s own greys. His tone is strong, sure, and leaving no room for argument. “You didn’t ask for any of it. You didn’t have a choice.”

Each word cuts Bucky to his core. He knows these things; he’s been told them over and over again by Steve. Hell, he’s _tried _telling them to himself. But the words’ meanings have never stuck because it was still _him _that did those things, _his finger _that pulled the triggers. It doesn’t matter that Hydra was controlling him; there are dozens dead because _he _killed them. And he that’s unforgivable to him.

He doesn’t realise that his head has been shaking in disagreement with Tony until he stops moving altogether. Tony is looking at him with a mixture of emotions, the most obvious of which is something like pity. It takes a breath for Bucky to calm the rapidly rising rage and stop himself from verbally lashing out. He doesn’t need to make more of an enemy of Tony, he just _hates _when people feel sorry for him, look down on him with a frown on their face because he had a bit of a rough go of it. From the memories he has of his pre-war self, the trait is nothing new, a fact which provides him a strange comfort.

“I don’t hate you for what Hydra did to my parents,” Tony interrupts his thoughts with a bombshell full of confetti and gummy bears rather than shrapnel. Did Bucky hear that correctly? How could he not be hated by this man? “I hate Hydra for that, just as I hate them for every goddamn thing that they put you through and every other goddamn thing they did to this planet and its people. If you’re looking for my forgiveness, I’m afraid I can’t give it to you. There is nothing that I have to forgive you for.”

Bucky’s heart is thumping in his chest. His mind is running a mile a minute trying to collect this new information and sift through it to find its meaning. He stays silent, not trusting his brain to find the right words, or his voice to project them into reality.

“You’re welcome to stay here, is what I’m trying to say. You deserve a chance to heal and to live a good life.”

Before Bucky can even open his mouth to argue, Tony holds his hand up. “No, I know you don’t think you’re worth anything, kiddo, but you are. I’ll keep telling you’re not to blame for as long as you need to hear it.”

Struggling through wave after wave of overwhelming emotions, Bucky can only nod and stutter out a weak “thank you, Tony” in return to his generous and magnanimous pardon. The release of anxiety is so powerful that, for now at least, he lets himself believe that he _could _deserve this life and these friends. He _could_ be good enough. He could right his and Hydra’s wrongs.

“Well,” Tony claps, standing up, “that was way too much touchy-feely for one day, don’t you think?”

Bucky blinks up at the man, stunned at how quickly he has bounced from the serious and back to his normal, upbeat self. Though, quite frankly, he should be used to it by now.

“I’m gonna go and work on some stuff and leave you to it.” He lays a hand on Bucky’s shoulder and looks intently down at him. His voice softens when he says, “I know you’ve been having a rough go of it. Eat your burger and try to get some sleep. If you’re ready, I have some safe and trustworthy therapists that might be able to help you.” Bucky flinches at the thought, but Tony ignores it. “You don’t need to immediately, but if you ever feel like you want to give it a shot, let me know, okay?”

With that, Tony stands and leaves without a look back, missing the flickering of multiple conflicting emotions as they flash across Bucky’s features; confusion, pain, grief, comfort, and most of all, relief.

The moment the door _snicks _shut behind Tony, Bucky buries his face in his hands and lets go of the build-up of tears behind his eyes. They fall slowly, streaming along his cheeks until they drop into his palms. The confession and admission of truth feels like a weight has been knocked off the chain that has been dragging him down, steadily drowning him for seventy years.

**Author's Note:**

> I’d be happier with a little more editing, but I wanted to get this up ASAP because it’s already a long time overdue.
> 
> Keep in mind that while the Avengers -save Steve and Tony- are not completely comfortable with Bucky here, at least at first, that is only for this fic. It’s still a one shot, no matter how convenient it is to read as an early-stages prequel to my other canon-divergent works. Don’t forget that. 
> 
> Thanks for reading! I love me some comments and kudos, so if you’re willing to give, then I’m willing to receive and hoard and live happily ever after.
> 
> xx


End file.
